


A Dash of Fear

by Lhea



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Creatures & Monsters, Angst, Downward Spiral, Dread, Gen, Mystery, Transformation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:01:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22359175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lhea/pseuds/Lhea
Summary: Marianne was never like other girls.She always preferred the embrace of a good book over a good friend, always preferred seclusion to inclusion. In her eyes, she had always been that way, and it was just a preference of hers from her upbringing. Nothing for her to worry about. Plenty of other girls were that way, even some girls within Garreg Mach.But Marianne could never be like other girls. Something made her truly different. She knew about her "curse" -- the Crest of the Beast -- but never quite understood what it meant for her life until she began her studies at Garreg Mach. Unbeknownst to her, the Crest has a will of its own, and it spells death for those around her.
Relationships: Marianne von Edmund & Hilda Valentine Goneril, Marianne von Edmund & Leonie Pinelli, Marianne von Edmund & Lysithea von Ordelia
Kudos: 8





	A Dash of Fear

**Author's Note:**

> Forewarning: I have quite literally NO IDEA where I am going with this. The premise sprung into my head while looking at vampire fanart, and I started extrapolating shit based on Marianne's Crest and using a weird secondary premise that maybe she wasn't always super depressed about everything?
> 
> Anyways, this'll be a fun ride. Please enjoy.

It had been two weeks since Marianne von Edmund enrolled into the Officers Academy at Garreg Mach Monastery. The term for the class of 1181 had only just begun, some of them having only met one another on the day of their arrival. Marianne, in truth, had found herself almost overwhelmed by the number of people surrounding her so suddenly. Growing up, she had never made much in the way of friends, though not of her own doing. Her adoptive father had always expressed concern with letting her close to other children, and so she had grown to appreciate the warm embrace of a good book in place of a good friend, whether for study or for leisure.

Hilda -- one of her only friends before the Academy -- approached her that afternoon and asked her to come to dinner with the other girls of the Golden Deer. “Come on, Marianne, it’ll be a good time!” she said. “I heard that they're serving a dish  _ right _ up your alley.”

Marianne looked up from her book. “Oh? What is it?”

“Some kind of soup thing, the chefs said that it’s made from white trout and chickpeas. And there’s gonna be a really good dessert after!”

Marianne hummed to herself. “That does sound quite good.” She returned to her book for a moment, finishing her page before stuffing a mark into the spine and snapping it shut. When she looked back up at Hilda, a smile had overtaken Marianne's face. “Okay, then. I'll give it a try and come along for tonight.”

“Yes!” Hilda exclaimed. “It’ll be  _ so. fun. _ You’ve not really met Lysithea and Leonie yet, have you? You’ll love them, they’re great gals. And you know what I always say, gals are pals, no matter what.”

Marianne nodded, though the words went through her ears without her properly hearing them. She had learned to tune out some of Hilda’s nonsense exclamations over the years. She wondered how she might handle a mass of people in the mess hall at once like that. If she were to succeed at the Academy, she supposed, then she would just have to get used to it.

That night, Marianne gathered with the other girls at a table in the mess hall. She recognized and could name each of Lysithea and Leonie, thankfully avoiding an embarrassing mishap with their names. The supper dishes were served not long after her arrival; true to Hilda’s word, the dish had been close to one which was commonly served at meals at the Edmund estate. Even the flavors and aromatics of the spice mixture seemed to match appropriately. Perhaps her family’s chefs had snuck this recipe into the monastery’s repertoire somehow.

Marianne, however, found it difficult to focus on her soup. Rather, her attention lingered on the steam pouring from the top of the bowl just across the table from her. Its contents remained untouched, practically ignored by the youngest of the three other girls with whom she dined. “You’re not going to let your soup run cold, are you?” she inquired.

“I’m not interested in this fishy soup stuff,” Lysithea answered with a scowl. “When is dessert again? I heard that they’re serving a peach sorbet tonight!”

_ Peach sorbet?  _ Marianne wondered. Perhaps she had chosen a good night to venture out of her room, after all.

“Hush up and eat something other than a sweet for once!” said Hilda. “You’re not gonna grow up big and strong if you keep downing sweets at every turn.”

A flush crept across Lysithea’s cheeks. “And just what would you know about that?! You’re barely taller than me, even though you’re more than three years older!”

“Twenty-five days isn’t even a month!” Hilda complained. “That doesn’t count as ‘more than three years older.’”

“And two inches doesn’t mean you get to tell me that I’ll grow up ‘big and strong.’” Lysithea gestured her fingers in air quotes around the words “big and strong.”

“Girls, please,” Leonie chipped in. “Can’t we just enjoy a nice meal together?”

Marianne giggled to herself. “I don’t think you’ll fend them off like that, Leonie,” she suggested before blowing on another spoonful of soup and shoveling it into her mouth. “I know Hilda well enough to know when she’s picked a fight that I can’t stop.”

Leonie sighed, and she pinched the bridge of her nose. “You’re probably right. Better to just let them duke it out. What could  _ possibly _ go wrong?” The two of them chose not to intervene any further, instead allowing Hilda and Lysithea to continue berating one another -- much to the joy of some of their male peers. Marianne and Leonie could only watch idly as the show before them played out. Marianne sipped at her soup in the meantime; Leonie, already finished with hers, drummed her fingers against the table in boredom.

Marianne noticed a woman approaching from the front of the mess hall, snaking through the pathways between the tables. She nudged Leonie’s arm with her elbow and pointed. The latter remarked, “Oh, good, the cavalry’s here.”

Manuela slunk behind the two bickering students, unnoticed by them. She held her hands clasped at her waist, her face contorted in disappointment as she watched their duel unfold. The boys who had previously been looking at the battle unfold in their own amusement returned to their own meals. Manuela’s gaze flipped to Leonie and Marianne across the table. Leonie shrugged and mirrored Manuela’s expression, her frown conveying uncertainty with how best to resolve their fight. Marianne tapped her index fingers together innocently and diverted her eyes away in shame.

Manuela cleared her throat. Hilda and Lysithea continued their bickering.

“You can’t go around just calling people old just because you’re so young, y’know!” Hilda exclaimed.

“And  _ you _ can’t just assume you know what’s better for people just because you have a teensy number more years under your belt!” Lysithea retorted.

Manuela rolled her eyes before clearing her throat again, projecting her volume forward. Hilda and Lysithea fell silent. They looked up together at the woman standing behind them. Lysithea’s eyes sunk into her skull and glazed over in fear. Hilda’s mouth hung open for a moment before morphing into a nervous grin.

“Need I remind you two,” Manuela began, her expression ironclad, “of what you were told less than a month ago during our welcoming ceremony? ‘The future of Fódlan’? ‘Common ground’? Ring any bells?”

Hilda and Lysithea looked back at one another sheepishly. They each nodded.

“Good,” said Maneula. “It would be  _ unfortunate _ if I had to drag you both to Seteth’s office after normal hours.” She glanced back at Marianne and Leonie, her expression shifting from one of disdain to a beaming glow. “Do enjoy the rest of your meal.”

Hilda and Lysithea did not speak for the rest of the supper hour. Lysithea, in particular, rummaged through her soup with idle traces of her spoon in search of anything resembling a delectable treat. A growl rumbled in her stomach until dessert came, as expected: a peach sorbet which she practically inhaled. Leonie contributed her own serving when asked. When prompted about it, she replied, “Never been much of one for sweets. Guess I just never developed a taste for ‘em? We never got much in the way of that kinda stuff in my village.”

Lysithea’s eyes widened in horror. “You’ve gone your  _ whole life _ without sweets?”

Leonie pondered this to herself for a moment, trying to recall the last time she had had anything sweeter than a ripe apple. “I think I had a pastry once when I was twelve,” she said, cupping her chin in one hand. “I almost threw up from how sweet it was! I don’t see how you can constantly crave ‘em all the time. Do you know what those’ll do to your teeth?”

Lysithea shoveled a spoonful of sorbet into her mouth. “Nonshensh!” she exclaimed while the sorbet melted on her tongue. She swallowed the morsel and beamed. “A life without sweets is no life worth living!”

“Yeah, well, guess I’ve got a death wish, then. More for you.”

Lysithea’s eyes lit up at the thought. Hilda rolled her eyes.

Marianne took a spoonful of sorbet after letting her own serving warm for a minute. The natural sugars sated a deep, almost carnal longing as it finished melting in her mouth. She relished the last hints of flavor after swallowing it. “I have to agree with Lysithea,” she remarked. “Not liking the taste of sugar is… surprising. Did you not even have fruit?”

“Oh, we had fruit, but I’m not sure that’s what you’d call sweet.” Leonie leaned forward and folded her arms on the table. “Y’all just don’t know what it’s like to grow up poor,” she said. A moment passed before she realized what she had said. “No offense, or anything. Just different environments.”

“Hm. Maybe you’ll warm up to them while here!” said Marianne with a smile plastered on her face. “The Officers Academy is all about new experiences, right?”

“‘Dessert’ isn’t quite what I had in mind to learn when I enrolled here.”

The girls shared a laugh together before returning to their own desserts. Lysithea had finished two by the time that Marianne and Hilda had each finished their own, much to their astonishment. After finishing their desserts, the girls returned their dishes to the front of the mess hall for the unfortunate soul who had been tasked with dish work for that night. Marianne noticed Ashe collecting the soiled dishware and ferrying them to the kitchen in the back room. She wondered to herself if he was on dish duty, or perhaps if he was just kind-hearted in that way. The cuffs of his uniform did not look as if they had been rolled up, nor did she see any remnants of soap suds on his hands or wrists. She smiled and made a mental note to talk to him again soon on their next free day.

Outside, a mixture of orange and violet tore through the evening sky as the sun began to set. The days had been growing long again after an unusually cold winter, much to Marianne’s own disdain. She was quite sure that the return of warm weather would promise more social outings. Such thoughts filled her with dread; she could take the occasional dinner together with these girls, but soon she’d almost certainly be asked to go to… class outings. She retched at the thought.

The girls of the Golden Deer parted ways at the staircase separating the first and second floor dormitories. Leonie and Lysithea remained on the first floor and scurried away into their own rooms, while Marianne followed Hilda up the stairs to the second floor. Hilda quickly bid Marianne farewell for the night and assured her that they would meet again in the morning for that week’s lecture.

Marianne slunk into her room and fastened the door behind her. She neglected to use its chain lock; she was surrounded by fellow students and friends, so why must she worry? She could count the number of students who frightened her on one hand. Perhaps even just one: that tall, raven-haired man from the Black Eagles… He reminded her of some old tropes in books that she might have read in her youth, what with his ghastly appearance and his narrow, analytical gaze always suggesting a sinister motive. If she didn’t know better, she might have called him a monster of some kind, or at the very least less than human.

She grabbed a book from a collection haphazardly stacked on her provisioned desk and threw it onto her unmade bed. A snap of her fingers ignited a faint flame at the tip of her thumb. She cupped her left hand around it and directed it to a fresh candle on the nightstand before blowing her conjuring out with a puff of air.

Marianne ceremoniously undressed herself, quickly donning her lighter evening wear in the place of her uniform before throwing herself into bed after her own book. The book was a fresh pick from the monastery’s expansive library, a recommendation from the librarian himself:  _ Of the Goddess’s Grace - A History of the Faith and Philosophy of Seiros _ , authored by Saint Indech himself. Marianne rested her head against one of many pillows and began to read.

The words and pages melded together, digging into the core philosophies driving the faith in her goddess. Marianne had found that Saint Indech himself proved to be a terribly terse and dry writer, making it difficult for her to focus despite her love for its content. Weariness slowly smothered her body.

The remaining students of the monastery who had lingered in the mess hall after supper returned to their rooms. The minutes ticked away as the final stripes of sunlight in the sky through her window vanished into the night. Stars flickered to life, and in the distance came the howl of a wolf from the Sealed Forest just outside the monastery grounds. Marianne’s eyelids grew heavier by the moment. Soon she could no longer find the strength to hold them open, and she surrendered herself to sleep. The book fell splayed open on her belly. An hour passed, and her candle slowly melted away bit by bit. In her mind, as she turned from the emptiness of deep rest to the bustling of her own dreams, she awoke.

  


* * *

  


Marianne’s gaze wandered about her surroundings. She found nothing but the usual empty void of her room. Papers were strewn here and there in her frantic studies; a few were no doubt the remnants of her most recent essay due from an optional seminar on faith from Professor Manuela. Yet something felt off. Her body felt particularly weightless. She looked at her hands. Were they her own? She felt as if she was not truly present within her own skin, like she was merely a watcher as her body acted of its own accord.

She looked up. Did she ever own a mirror? She traced her right hand across her face. This was definitely her own face, yet she did not recognize it as her own.

The left side of her face contorted into a demonic form. Her lips curled into a snarl, and she bore her teeth. Her canines had never been that pointed. Her nostrils had never flared that wide, nor had her nose ever been that long. Her eyes had never been so dark, so empty, nor had she ever had bags under them. She reeled away in horror. That could not have been her. She did not look like that. She had always been at least attentive about taking care of herself, even if she let herself grow neglectful of her own surroundings from time to time. She might be disorganized, but she was no… whatever that was that she saw in the mirror.

As she lifted her eyes again, she found that her room had grown empty. Her belongings vanished one by one. First her clothes, then her collection of books, then her candles and the paintings hung on her walls. Scrambling, she turned her eyes to her bed. The book still lay there, splayed across the mattress with its spine facing out. She reached for it, but it too vanished just beneath her fingertips.

Amidst the nothingness, she found herself alone. The solitude in the black wore at her senses in a slow, steady grind. Without a light to guide her eyes, she found her other senses strengthen. In the distance, she heard something. A hum? A playful song from a nearby animal?

Her eyesight returned. A fox pup ran towards her with a playful skip. Its ears perked with a distinctive point, and its snout curled into something resembling a smile. Marianne knelt to the earth. The pup’s presence calmed her, soothing her just enough to elicit a smile of her own. She held out open palms to welcome the small animal into her embrace. “Come along, that’s right,” she said. “We can share a bit of time together and forget about all the troubles of the world.”

A gray wolf appeared in the distance, already charging in her direction. Marianne looked ahead to assess it. Foam dripped from its mouth, and its tongue lapped out lazily. Its paws pounded in a threatening rhythm. A certain sinister look swirled in its empty eyes. Marianne recognized it: hunger.

She ran for the pup in a hurried sprint.

But the wolf was faster, and it pounced on the pup with an open maw and bared fangs.

The vision dissipated into nothingness, taking the fox and wolf with it. Marianne collapsed back to her knees. Tears tugged at the corners of her eyes, and she began to sob.  _ It’s just a dream, _ she told herself.  _ Just a nightmare. None of this is real. It’s all wrong.  _ She dug her fingers between strands of her hair, gripping at clumps of it and trying to free herself from the mental prison. The chains shackling her to the dream did not budge. She whimpered. “No… no, no, no!”

At her scream, the void slowly swirled back into a resemblance of reality. Marianne found herself in the back kitchen of the monastery mess hall. Soiled dishes were piled up along the countertop to the right side of the main sink basin, organized into stacks according to their size. To the left side of the basin, freshly cleaned dishes sat in similar stacks. A figure stood in front of the basin, humming a tune to himself as he dried a dish with his rag. His shaggy silver locks accentuated the royal blue hood that he’d fashioned onto his uniform. He had unfastened the cuffs of his sleeves and rolled them up his forearms to just below the elbow. Ashe noticed her over his shoulder. “Oh, Marianne!” he said with a charming up-turn in his voice. “I’m surprised to see you. Didn’t you leave with your friends earlier?”

She pondered that for a moment. “No, I suppose that I didn’t,” she replied.

“Uh-huh, I see.” Ashe scrubbed his rag over a freshly cleaned dish, drying it of excess moisture before placing it into a stack on his left. “And you’re in your evening wear because…?”

Marianne looked down to examine herself. Ashe was right; she was still wearing her evening wear. “Oh, um. I suppose that I must find it quite comfortable.”

Ashe cocked an eyebrow. “Right. Well, anyway, if you’re here, would you like to help me with the dishes? It’s getting awfully late, and I’d like to get some shut-eye soon.”

Marianne smiled. Perhaps she could find some happy ending to this nightmare in feeling useful to another person. “I’d love to,” she replied. “Where can I help out?”

“There’s a rag over there!” said Ashe. He pointed to a spare scrap of cloth hanging on a nearby wall. “I’ll take care of scrubbing the dirty dishes if you’d like to dry them when I’m done, okay?”

Marianne nodded, fetched the rag, and joined Ashe near the basin. He funnelled dish after dish to her as he was able to finish scrubbing their surfaces clean in his sudsy water. She struggled to keep up with his pace, but it took little time for the two of them to work in tandem to finish the remaining dishes. Once Ashe had finished scrubbing his last dish clean, he turned to help dry off what Marianne had yet to finish. “See?” said Ashe. “I told you that we’d be done super quick with us working together! I appreciate your help a lot, Marianne.”

With their task completed, Marianne took a deep breath. She smoothed out the front side of her evening wear. “That was a lot more work than I expected,” she said.

“No kidding!” Ashe replied. “I didn’t expect there to be this much when I signed up for dish duty tonight. Guess we had an extra couple of mouths to feed or something.” His eyes wandered to the kitchen window for a moment. “Hey, wow! Marianne, you should look out the window. It’s gorgeous!”

Marianne looked to the window pointing toward the monastery’s chapel. Night still held its grip on the sky. The full breadth of the Pegasus Moon glimmered just outside of view in the open window, hanging among the stars in a backdrop for the chapel spires. A few wisps of gray clouds obstructed the view, but far from enough to make it any less beautiful. Marianne smiled. “You’re right, Ashe. It’s gorgeous.”

The last wisp of cloud hiding any glimmer of the moon faded away. Marianne’s pulse quickened.

“Mhm. Anyways. Thanks again for your help, Marianne. I’m gonna head to my room. You should, too, before Seteth finds us and yells at us for being out so late!”

The conjured flames of the kitchen candles wisp away with a chilly gust of wind. Marianne’s senses dull even as her heart rate climbs ever higher. Each breath feels more strenuous than the last, as if she were struggling to hold in air and keep herself afloat before being thrown back beneath the ocean waves. She pulls her hands in front of her face and examines them in the moonlight. Her nails had grown long and sharp, more resembling the talons of an eagle than any human fingers. Were they really hers?

She blinked once. In the next instant, she had pinned Ashe against the kitchen floor, holding one hand over his mouth and the other over his arm. She straddled his waist, one of her legs splayed out to pin Ashe’s free arm. Ashe’s knees beat against her back in an arrhythmic frenzy. His voice vibrated into her hands, and he fought desperately to wrest his mouth free in hopes that he could bite into her hand and create an opening for himself. Marianne, instead, took a sick pleasure in the muffled cries echoing into her palm and up her arm. “That’s it,” Marianne whispered as she leaned forward, drawing her face mere inches above her own. “That’s the look that I’ve craved for so long. The perfect amount of fear to season the meat.”

Ashe’s eyes widened. Marianne licked her lips at the taste of his terror. She shifted her hand from over his mouth to grip his neck, squeezing with just enough pressure to close his windpipe but not enough to break his neck. Ashe’s gasps for air resonated in her ears like the playful melody of a children’s lullaby.

“Scream all you want,” Marianne hissed. “Not a soul in this monastery will find you alive.”

The color drained from Ashe’s face. At that moment, Marianne knew that her window to kill would soon close. She pressed her lips to Ashe’s.

And she jolted upright.

Marianne’s chest heaved as she gasped for breath. A cold sweat trailed down her forehead and arms. Daylight surrounded her. She looked around frantically and was only greeted by the familiar sights of her room. Another deep breath. “Collect yourself, Marianne,” she whispered to herself while reaching for the book which now lay open face-up in her lap. She snapped it shut and returned it to her nightstand. Her fresh candle had fully melted overnight, much to her disdain. “Guess I was really tired…”

Three knocks came to her door. “Marianne!” The voice from beyond her door was Hilda’s. “Marianne, are you up?”

“Yes, Hilda,” Marianne answered.

“Good, now get your butt out of bed and get dressed or we’ll be late!”

“Oh! R-right, yes!” Leaping from bed, Marianne hastily reached for yesterday’s uniform and dressed herself. She was certain that she’d look a mess in lecture today, but she couldn’t bring herself to care.

Content enough with her lack of will to polish herself, she collected her lecture notes and

unlocked her door. Hilda’s beaming face greeted her, but it quickly soured. “You look like you barely slept a wink!” Hilda exclaimed. She held the back of her hand against Marianne’s forehead. “You feeling okay?”

Marianne gently brushed the hand away. “Yes. I just… had a bad dream, that’s all.”

Hilda put her hands on her hips. “If you say so. If you feel like you should stay in and get some rest, then I’m sure Professor Manuela won’t mind. I can just tell her that you’re feeling sick over something you ate!”

“Hilda, please.” Marianne averted her gaze. She clutched her lecture notes tight against her chest. “I’ll be perfectly fine. I promise.”

Hilda scoffed but begrudgingly accepted Marianne’s insistence. The two of them descended the stairs to the first floor of the dormitories together, where Leonie and Lysithea stood in wait for them. “Where have you been?” the latter exclaimed impatiently. “We have less than five minutes to get to lecture, and I do not have time to be late!”

“So then why did you stick around?” Leonie quipped. “I could have just as easily met them here and been a little tardy. Not like I care much about what an opera singer has to say about combat.”

Lysithea squinted at Leonie and growled.

“Yeah, yeah,” Hilda started. “I just wanted to make sure Marianne got out of bed! And she’s here, and we’ve still got enough time to get to lecture.”

A faint grumble emanated from Marianne’s throat. “You didn’t have to tell them, you know…,” she whispered with a pout.

Hilda glanced at Marianne with a worried glint in her eyes before she shook her head. “Whatever you say,” she remarked.

“Are we going or what?” Lysithea asked. “Five minutes is now three!”

The Golden Deer girls walked together through the first floor of the dormitories. A handful of the students on the first floor emerged from their rooms in similar states of dress. One in particular left his room with a disinterested yawn and a lazily tied tail in his hair; this made Marianne feel pleasant about herself, despite the disarray in her hair and her uniform. Others only reminded her of how unpresentable she must look at this moment, without enough time to properly care for herself in the morning. She shook her head rapidly, as if to force the thoughts out of her mind. Today would be okay. She wouldn’t let a silly dream get to her like that.

Lecture was uneventful. Professor Manuela seemed to be dealing with her own suite of issues getting going in the morning, judging by the stupor with which she carried herself into the classroom. A clumsy stumble here or there would certainly be normal, but this seemed reminiscent of the times that Marianne’s father had returned from a “wine tasting,” as he called it. She, of course, knew what it meant, but always giggled at the penchant that adults had for hiding their drinking habits. Nevertheless, Professor Manuela delivered her lecture as eloquently as could be expected for a woman in her current state.

After the lecture, Marianne, Hilda, Leonie, and Lysithea proceeded to their lunch break in the mess hall together, as they often did on lecture days. Marianne did not find the dish particularly memorable. While sitting with her classmates, she tuned out their conversation. Something tugged at her heart, a sense of… something which weighed heavily on her. She was not certain whether it made sense to call it any of grief, regret, or guilt. She had not done anything worth those emotions.

She did, however, notice something curious while mulling over her dish, something which frayed her nerves. Marianne picked her chin up and browsed through the dining hall with a cursory glance. It was then that she really understood what felt off about today.

She had not seen Ashe all day.


End file.
